RTB Or Real-Time Bidding Is The Future Of Digital And Mobile Advertising — Here's What You Need To Know

Real-time bidding is a type of automated or programmatic buying of advertising placements.

It is to digital advertising what high-frequency trading is to Wall Street. It involves computerized, algorithm-driven trading that allows for quick buying of ad impressions according to pre-set parameters. Twitter is the latest tech company to enter the RTB race with this month's acquisition of MoPub, an ad exchange with a real-time bidding platform.

On the desktop, programmatic or automated buying of display ads has already made huge inroads. Its advocates say that it has led to a more transparent and efficient digital ad market. But it is in mobile where programmatic buying may make the most difference. That's because smartphones are advertising platforms that we carry in our pockets, and with RTB that means marketers can reach us in real-time, and target potential customers according to location and context.

In a recent reportfrom BI Intelligence on real time bidding (RTB), we explain what RTB is, analyze how itmay help solve the mobile advertising CPM problem, detail its recent impact and successes on ad buyers and sellers, examine the potential obstacles to its widespread adoption, and look at how the holy grail of mobile advertising — simultaneous scale, controls and efficiencies — may be reached through its use.